


A Tool To Be Used

by AgentVeronica



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Ambition, Death Star, Dubious Consent, M/M, Widowed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-17
Updated: 2016-12-17
Packaged: 2018-09-09 03:31:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8874088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AgentVeronica/pseuds/AgentVeronica
Summary: "Orson's smile is genuine; more than that, it's tinged with a kind of greedy anticipation, distantly familiar. Once or twice, Galen noted this expression on Orson's face in the early days, before he knew about Lyra. He's always been aware that, had Orson Krennic had his way, their relationship would have taken a very different cast."
Galen Erso gets into bed with the devil.





	

"They'll find her," Orson says. His hand rests on Galen's shoulders for a moment that lasts infinitesimally too long. "We'll have Jyn back with you any moment."

He speaks as though he means to reassure Galen rather than threaten him. Dully Galen wonders whether both intentions coexist inside Orson Krennic's labyrinthine mind, on opposite sides of the barriers within. To such a man, doting on a little girl and threatening to kill her doesn't represent a contradiction. They're merely different tasks for different moments.

Galen should be petrified with terror for his daughter. But fear died with Lyra. He would be more afraid for his daughter if he could stop thinking about the sight of his wife's dead body on the ground, with the grasses bend down around her.

"I understand why you lied about Lyra." Orson's hands are clasped behind his back. He speaks kindly, compassionately, as though anyone in all the worlds could be fool enough _not_ to understand lying to Imperial officials. "You'll feel better once you've begun the work. The challenge will inspire you. It always has, always will."

The "challenge" of finding a way to kill billions of people at the push of a button. If Galen were any less exhausted and wrung-out, the horror would make him physically ill.

As it is, he sits numbly in an Imperial shuttlecraft, hoping against hope that he'll never see his daughter again.

For the very last time in his life, Galen Erso's hopes aren't in vain. Late in the night, the search for Jyn is finally called off. The Emperor wants work to begin immediately; there is no more time to be wasted looking for lost little girls. When the shuttle lifts off, Galen imagines her sitting in the tiny shelter they'd prepared, all alone.

_Lyra ought to have been with her—my beloved, why did you think you could save me? Didn't you know Jyn was the only one we could still save? I was already lost._

_I was lost the day Orson Krennic learned what I was capable of._

His weary eyes look up as Orson stands in front of him. The sorrow in his eyes looks real as he says, "I'm so sorry, Galen. Sorrier than you'll ever know. I wish it hadn't come to this."

Galen chooses to believe that every word is sincere. He has to have something to hold onto, even if it's only an illusion. Otherwise his body might as well be as dead as his heart.

"I wish that too," he says. "I'm sorry too."

When Orson touches his shoulder again, it's a long time before he lets go.

 

**

 

Six months later, Galen has begun his impersonation of a man satisfied with his lot in life. Only begun, of course: Nothing would ring more false than his suddenly being filled with good cheer. But he's started taking care in how he dresses again. Going for strolls on the skywalk that shows the far horizon at sunset. Accepting a glass of Corellian ale with dinner.

Smiling when Orson Krennic enters the room.

Orson has never been happier, so far as Galen can tell, and he suspects he understands the man's inner workings better than Orson does himself. Nothing is more important to Emperor Palpatine than the completion of the Death Star project; that means almost no person is more important than Director Krennic. Even moffs are jealous of him.

(Not Lord Vader. That… _thing_ has gone beyond emotions so recognizably human as jealousy. But no one discusses Vader outside of his presence. Galen suspects that most people do what he does and try to forget such a being exists.)

It's advantageous, these days, to be in Orson Krennic's favor. Galen never asked for that favor, but he has it nonetheless. Time to begin pretending he values it.

"Rumor has it you'll be taking a quick vacation from the project," he says over dinner. They're seated opposite each other on a long table where others can and will join them, but it feels as though they're alone.

Orson raises an eyebrow. "Are they calling it a vacation?"

Galen's smile is rusty, out of practice. He hopes it looks sly. "Yes. That way they don't have to admit that you're going to Coruscant to meet with the Emperor himself."

"Well, well. The rumor mill got something right for once." Orson looks so satisfied with himself. Galen's hands tense around his eating utensils, but he manages not to betray his anger. They've only just started allowing him a knife.

"Do you suppose he'll ever come here?" Galen asks. "To inspect the project for himself."

Orson's silent for a few long moments. Did that sound as though he were hoping to assassinate the Emperor? The thought hadn't crossed his mind—at least, until now—but it's a suspicion he can't afford to ignite.

But then Orson says, "I doubt he'll ever put in an appearance before the project's significantly closer to completion. But, you know, maybe someday I'll bring you along to Coruscant with me."

There is nothing Galen could want less. Surely Orson knows that. This can only be a taunt, another threat veiled in velvet, one more way of digging under his captive's skin…

No. It isn't.

Orson's smile is genuine; more than that, it's tinged with a kind of greedy anticipation, distantly familiar. Once or twice, Galen noted this expression on Orson's face in the early days, before he knew about Lyra. He's always been aware that, had Orson Krennic had his way, their relationship would have taken a very different cast.

But he'd never realized that Orson still wanted that. He still hopes for it. Still, after his troopers shot Lyra dead in a field, since Stardust ran for her life into what might as well have been oblivion…

Galen tamps down his anger. It can't help him now.

He has to start thinking of emotions the way Orson does: as tools to be used.

"We never have taken a journey together, have we?" Galen says as lightly as he can manage. "Too much to do here right now, of course, but someday—"

"Someday," Orson repeats. His smile widens, and he shows a flicker of the vulnerability known as hope.

Were Orson Krennic anyone else, Galen could almost pity him.

 

**

 

After that day, the dinner invitations begin to arrive. Meetings in the dining hall won't do any longer; it doesn't matter that the hall is sumptuous, very nearly palatial. Exclusivity means luxury, and Galen Erso exclusively is invited to dine in Director Krennic's personal apartments.

To Galen's surprise, these apartments are sparsely if elegantly furnished. No ill-gotten artwork bedecks the walls; no handwoven carpets disguise the hard-edged tiling on the floors. The only real beauty to be had is the view.

"Such sunsets we have here." Orson stands in front of the wide windows, a wistful expression on his face. The fading orange light brightens the amber ale in his glass. "I don't think I ever really appreciated sunsets, before. Now that they're one of the few pleasures to be had—well. I finally see what luxuries they are."

Galen takes a deep draught of the ale before he can bring himself to answer. "I imagine other pleasures can be had here," he manages to say. "Or at least, can be created."

Orson's sidelong glance leaves no doubt as to the pleasures he's imagining. The trap has been baited.

_Forgive me, Lyra_ , Galen thinks. _My heart belongs only to you now and forever._

His body, like his emotions, is a tool to be used.

 

**

 

One month later, it happens. The servitor droid pours wine more lavishly than usual, no doubt under instructions. Galen drinks every bit of it, the better to numb himself to the inevitable.

Then, over the Alderaanian ices they have for dessert, Orson tells a story about Imperial cadets' foolishness in the Academy that's genuinely funny, so much so that Galen laughs until his sides hurt. The wine tastes delicious. The music playing over the speakers is subtly sensuous, not insultingly louche. And the soft sunset light paints away years from Orson's face, taking Galen's mind back to when they were still hardly more than boys and his friend was not yet lost to madness.

Darkness has just fallen when Galen sinks onto one of the long, low couches, when Orson follows him to kneel by his side. When their mouths meet in the first kiss, Galen manages to act surprised.

"We shouldn't," he gasps as Orson pulls his jacket open. Some token resistance is necessary for believability. "The others will suspect—"

"I don't give a damn about the others." Orson's hands run down Galen's bare chest. "Only you."

Another kiss, deeper and fiercer than the last. It's shocking how natural it feels to fuck someone out of hate rather than love.

"Let me make it all up to you," Orson says. The fact that he's admitting what Galen has lost—admitting fault to it—makes everything so much more difficult that for one instant Galen's not sure he can go through with it.

But then Orson's kneeling on the floor, unfastening Galen's pants. When his mouth closes over Galen's member, hot and wet, Galen grabs Orson by his hair and guides him. Makes sure Orson takes him in deep. _That's right_ , he thinks in a daze, _suck me off. Suck me hard. You owe me this, you son of a bitch, I'm going to come down your throat—_

He does, and his orgasm is so overwhelmingly good that he doesn't even want to resist afterward, when Orson strips off all his clothes and rolls Galen onto his stomach. It's easy to lie there, even with Orson Krennic on him, in him, thrusting hard and panting against Galen's back. A drop of Orson's sweat falls on his bare shoulder blade.

_A tool to be used_ , Galen reminds himself. _Nothing but that._

 

**

 

What follows is the longest sexual relationship of Galen's life. He counts the months and even days until they've outpaced his love affair and marriage to Lyra, and on that day he feigns illness and spends the day in bed. In the dark, with no one to witness, Galen cries hot tears of loss and shame.

The loss is old. The shame is new.

Because—Force help him—he doesn't hate being Orson Krennic's lover.

Sometimes he likes it.

Sometimes he loves it.

_"Is this what you want?" Orson panting, hands on Galen's hips as Galen braces himself on the balcony rail. "To watch the sunset while you climax for me?"_

_"Yes."_

_Or kneeling in Orson's quarters, mouth open, letting Orson fuck his face, touching himself the whole time, so hard that he might finish just from the taste in his mouth, or the exhilarated smile on Orson's face that tells him he's doing this just right—_

"Forgive me," he whispers as he lies in his bed. He tries to remember what Lyra looked like next to him. In particular he attempts to envision one of the days just before Jyn was born, when Lyra's belly was so huge they joked about having a third person in bed with them.

He can't remember it in any detail. Not the way he remembers the sound of Orson's moans the night before, in this same bed.

That night, Orson comes to him all tenderness and concern. He brings soup. Galen chokes it down. He's genuinely grateful, which makes it all a thousand times worse.

 

**

 

Since the beginning, Galen has kept himself alive through one tangible source of hope. Maybe he'll never see the outside of this project, but he can determine the end of it.

_Stardust_ , he calls the Death Star project; it's on all the confidential files. When he really thinks about it, the only part that surprises him in the slightest is that this name didn't tip off Orson Krennic. After all this time—all these years—Orson still doesn't understand his lover well enough to know that there's no way in all the fires of Mustafar that Galen Erso would ever call this monstrosity by the same name he used for his adored daughter, not unless there was a reason.

The reason is coded deep within an exhaust port. It's the fuse for Galen's one and only bomb.

Of course, when it explodes, it will kill Galen himself. It will kill thousands—maybe hundreds of thousands—of Imperial officers, many of whom have no more choice in their fates than Galen does. If the Force smiles upon him, maybe it will kill Lord Vader. Maybe even the Emperor himself…though that might be wishing for too much.

Almost certainly it will kill Orson Krennic. There is nothing Galen hates more than realizing that this possibility is the hardest to bear.

He still hates Orson. He couldn't not hate the man who saw Lyra killed, who chased Jyn into a fate Galen will almost certainly never know. But he doesn't _only_ hate him. He also knows the way Orson snores. How Orson gulps down water after a nightmare, and that he has nightmares very nearly every single time he sleeps. The acid perfection of Orson's impersonation of Grand Moff Tarkin. Which wines Orson likes, and which ones he merely tolerates because he knows Galen likes them.

They've shared quarters, these past two years. Although certain prejudices of Palpatine's keep Orson from marrying Galen outright, everyone on the Death Star project acknowledges them as a couple as good as wed. As two people joined together for life. They're more right than they know. Galen intends for their joining to end with death, a death he's shaped for them both, painstakingly, since this work began.

He's never questioned the rightness of that except once.

"You wonder, sometimes, what it's all about." Orson sat on their balcony, drinking nothing stronger than tea. "They already control the entire galaxy…all of it worth controlling, at any rate. What else is there to claim?"

"It seems futile," Galen says. Only after the words are out does he realize he spoke honestly, without artifice. It's the first time in all these years he's spoken that way to Orson about anything besides which touches are most likely to get him off.

If Orson notices the difference, he shows no sign. "The money they've sunk into this damned thing, and the duplicate that's still only half-done—imagine what else might've been done with that."

"They could have accomplished great things." Galen's heart has begun beating faster. "Made every planet prosperous beyond the need for any rebellion."

Shouldn't have said that. He ought to have called it "unrest" or "terrorism" instead. But, still, Orson doesn't reject what he's said. Instead he nods thoughtfully, his hand reaching absently for Galen's.

_Is it possible?_ Galen wonders. _Could Orson finally have awakened from this madman's dream of power and privilege? Could he see the harm of it?_

_Could he be my ally rather than my enemy?_

_Could any of this be real?_

"We could rain wealth and ease upon the entire galaxy." Orson turns to him and smiles. "But where's the fun in that?"

Hatred slams Galen's heart shut again, for good this time. Inside are locked Lyra and Jyn, and the secret fuse of the bomb he now knows he will do anything to ignite. And if he and Orson Krennic perish on those flames…

So much the better.

"The fun's yet to come," Galen says, and sips his tea. When Orson squeezes his fingers, he squeezes back.

 

 

 

 

FINIS


End file.
